Thursday, December 9, 2010

Week 13 Power Rankings and Thursday game pick

My Miami vacation has pushed back some features this week, but I'm finally posting Week 13 power rankings.

While I'm here, I'll also throw it out there that I like the Colts tonight over the Titans. I can't see Peyton Manning playing this bad. He's just too talented, and eventually he's going to pick this team up. The Titans just aren't scoring right now, while the Colts still are.

Now on to the power rankings:

The Top 10

1. Atlanta Falcons (10-2; last week: 1st) — The Falcons continue to roll with a big divisional win over the Buccaneers and look like the cream of the NFC crop.

2. New England Patriots (10-2; last week: 2nd) — Can I say the Patriots are 1b to the Falcons' 1a. After a dominant performance over a good Jets team, the Pats are looking as good as ever.

3. Pittsburgh Steelers (9-3; last week: 5th) — They haven't been killing teams by any stretch, but winning on the road in Baltimore was huge.

4. Baltimore Ravens (8-4; last week: 4th) — I can't fault them too much for losing to their extremely talented division foe, so I'm not going to drop them.

5. New Orleans Saints (9-3; last week: 6th) — Things got a little close against the Bengals, but they pulled it out for their ninth win and are still playing good football.

6. New York Jets (9-3; last week: 3rd) — Their loss to New England was a flat-out whooping, but the Jets are too talented to let it happen twice.

7. Chicago Bears (9-3; last week: 7th) — No doubt the Bears are playing well right now, but I just like the above six teams better and thus can't move Chicago up this week.

8. Green Bay Packers (8-4; last week: 8th) — They handled the 49ers easily as they should have and are very much alive in the NFC North hunt.

9. Philadelphia Eagles (8-4; last week: 9th) — The Eagles got back on track with a win over Houston and are scary on offense.

10. Kansas City Chiefs (8-4; last week: 10th) — They weren't all that impressive in a 10-6 win over the Broncos, and it remains to be seen if they can survive a potential absence of Matt Cassel (appendectomy).